12 November 2005

It sounds too good to be true. The new Medicare prescription drug benefit, whose projected costs threaten to make the Iraq War look like a cheap night out on the town by comparison, could well be so confusing that seniors won't be able to take full advantage of it. Said one senior:

"With the new program you go home at night, and your mind is totally boggled, so confused that you think, 'Golly, is it worth it?'

If enough of the elderly take that attitude, the country may yet be saved from fiscal ruin. Just how complicated is the drug benefit?

After a two-hour class at the Jewish Community Center of Northern Virginia, Mr. Samet used a Yiddish word to describe his state of mind. "Farmisht," he said. "Mixed up. All of us here are mixed up."

This program is apparently so complicated even retired Jews can't figure it out!

Now I don't wish to sound callous towards the plight of senior citizens - cetainly not like this proposal, for example. But while there are no doubt a number of hardship cases, there does not seem to be any existing broad health-care crisis relating to unmedicated senior citizens that should have justified this kind of expenditure given our current budget and trade deficits. So let confusion rein!